Welcome to Incremental Social! Learn more about this project here!
Check out lemmyverse to find more communities to join from here!

BoringHusband ,

I do this too. It's called 'software development '.

phoenixz ,

I hate cheaters

Wells Fargo

I'll allow it

Eezyville ,
@Eezyville@sh.itjust.works avatar

Wells Fargo must think this is some sort of flex.

RagingRobot ,

I think this is propaganda so other companies can say, "wells Fargo had an issue with this so we are going to start cracking down too". Then they can lay off a bunch of people and not have to give severance.

Jimmyeatsausage ,

They fired 12 employees of a workforce numbering over 216,000. Looks like they fired 1000x more employees (literally...12000) last year just because "that's business." What a nothingburger.

3volver ,

If they're firing people for this then the way they judge employee productivity is incorrect. What I want to know is what did these employees even do day to day? Sounds like a whole bunch of bullshit job positions to me. Wells Fargo is a shit leech corporation, drain on society, middle-man hell.

werefreeatlast ,

It works like this. You work your ass off. Then when you've earned money, give it to them. Still with me? If you give them your money, they'll figure out a way to give your money to someone else to make money off of them. You'll get a small meaningless cut from the deal. They earn that money and pay shit to their employees who are wiggling mice around.

Noodle07 ,

Know what the people I play world of warcraft with do, I'd say they're busy playing world of warcraft

BigBananaDealer ,
@BigBananaDealer@lemm.ee avatar

i work with a guy who used to play that at work until one day the big boss caught him

Raxiel ,

Did the boss drop any good loot?

Notyou ,
@Notyou@sopuli.xyz avatar

Yeah, a legendary bow. A bow that had magical ammo, so you didn't have to by any arrows. The hunters thought they were going to have to roll for it, but the GM just gave it to the Rogue for the extra stats. Whole guild ended up breaking up.

prosp3kt ,

We cant use the same performance metrics used in other industries on IT. I could be struggling with a coding problem for hours but it doesn't mean im not working.

whoisearth ,
@whoisearth@lemmy.ca avatar

The amount of times I've logged off work with a coding problem only to stew on it for 4 hrs including when I'm laying in bed. I'm not billing work for any minute of that nor would I be able to if I tried. Game is fucking rigged in favour of the employer.

Taalen ,

I realize I'm very privileged. If I'm working on an issue for a whole day or a half day, everything I do during that day is part of the solution and will be billed to the customer (and I'll be paid for by my employer too). If that includes taking a nap, so be it. Results are what matter, as it should be. If someone ever starts saying I'm taking too long to do something I may consider changing my ways.

KAYDUBELL ,

Similar problem for me as a lawyer. I can have a case that keeps me up at night stewing and trying to think of a solution, but I feel it would be ethically irresponsible to bill them for 5 hours when I’m not “technically” working on their case.

billwashere ,

Just because I’m not sitting at a keyboard doesn’t mean my brain isn’t working on the problem. I’ve had epiphanies taking a shit before. I’m a systems architect so not really a code monkey but I solved a DNS/networking issue the other day doing dishes. No idea why it hit me then but then again I have ADHD and my brain is fucking weird.

sugar_in_your_tea ,

Eh, it's pretty common for your subconscious to process things in the background. If I'm stuck on a problem at the end of the day, I leave early and I'll have solved it 9/10 times by the time I get to work the next day. I don't have ADHD AFAIK (never tested nor felt the need to be), so I'm pretty sure it's a common experience for creative jobs.

Bruncvik ,
@Bruncvik@lemmy.world avatar

If you worked for me (or any other of about 20 PO's at my company), you'd be comfortable telling me that you were struggling. You'd explain the challenge and your estimate to completion, and I'd either reshuffle our priority list so that you could park the task and pick another one, or find someone for a pair programming session with you. That's the common practice, and nobody should care whether you're yellow on Teams or use a mouse jiggler, as long as you communicate your work and challenges.

btaf45 ,

or find someone for a pair programming session with you.

Then you would make it take longer.

Fedizen ,

why though? Were they not getting enough done?
And if its only like a dozen, does it justify the productiviry loss of hiring keyboard police?

CileTheSane ,
@CileTheSane@lemmy.ca avatar

Were they not getting enough done?

If not then fire them for that. Seems like a better metric that's more related to how well they do their job than "how much has your mouse moved?"

SloppyPuppy ,

Not defending them. But ill take their position for a second. I give x amount of work and expect you to finish it. And you do. But if that work takes you 2 hours and the rest of the day you do nothing it just means I can give you more work because 2 hours is just abysmal. So I wanna know about it.

FloatingAlong ,

Right, but if you're paying x for y amount of work, then once y is complete and you expect y to increase, does x increase as well?

CileTheSane ,
@CileTheSane@lemmy.ca avatar

So is my work measured by how much I move the mouse? In my job if I used an automatic mouse jiggler it would have zero effect on my employment, because I'm not being employed to move my mouse, I'm being employed to do productive work.

It's insane that such a program was useful. If your boss doesn't know the difference between you working or not, and only knows how much your mouse moves, that is a shit boss who is terrible at their job.

Malfeasant ,

Having worked in the financial industry for many years, I'm betting this has more to do with security than performance. Timeout before your screen locks is ridiculously short - you could be reading something, therefore not moving your mouse, then your screen locks, and you have to put in your password to unlock it. Then there's the nature of call center work, if you're not super busy, you might have a few minutes between calls, but when one comes in, you have to be immediately ready for it, not sitting there typing an overly complex password while an impatient customer is trying to give you all their information right away before you can take it down .. so I totally get the usefulness of a mouse jiggler. I wrote my own in Java way back when- actually it didn't jiggle the mouse, it was simpler to simulate a benign keypress, but same effect. I wrote it myself because I couldn't download one, any reputable site that I might get one from was blocked- but who knows, if I hadn't had the knowledge to write it, I might have been more motivated to find one, any one, any way, and that of course is a big nono- that's how keyloggers and shit like that end up compromising systems and leaking millions of passwords and/or credit card numbers... So I get why the company is concerned, even though I don't care.

sugar_in_your_tea ,

Honestly, the whole concept of locked down machines makes no sense to me. If you don't trust your employees, why did you hire them? Let them configure their own machines and secure the edge network and physical premesis. Happy employees won't steal from you, and they'll be motivated to protect their workstations so they can keep their job.

I just... don't understand any of it, and refuse to work anywhere that doesn't give me admin/root access to my work machine. Just let me do my job and you'll be happier with my performance...

intensely_human ,

How much the mouse moved is explicitly, pointedly NOT the metric they were fired for.

The reason is in the headline.

CileTheSane ,
@CileTheSane@lemmy.ca avatar

How much work they were getting done is explicitly, pointedly NOT the metric they were fired for.

Why would a mouse jiggler be effective for any reason unless it was a metric being measured?

ClassifiedPancake ,

Exactly what I keep saying. Do they get the job done? Yes or No? Very simple question in my opinion.

intensely_human ,

Some people are paid on the basis of time, not accomplishment.

uriel238 ,
@uriel238@lemmy.blahaj.zone avatar

They don't care about productivity. They care about the appearance of control, and the revelation of subversive activity is a gross embarassment to the ego that thrives on that control.

It's a bully having a tantrum because his victims don't fear him enough.

Melvin_Ferd ,

To entrench back to office sentiment

Semi_Hemi_Demigod ,
@Semi_Hemi_Demigod@lemmy.world avatar

Joke's on them, I can slack off just as hard in an office as I can at home

Malfeasant ,

More, even.

juice702 ,

So glad I work a job where if I show 'Away' on Teams no one says anything, because my work is getting done. Sounds like bad management imo.

Zink ,

I’ve noticed that I’m in away mode way more in office than when working from home. Nobody has ever said anything to me, but I guess I get more self conscious about it when I’m at home.

But then I’ve realized that ever since I started running Linux and using the browser versions of the M365 apps, I’m in Away mode a lot and I should just ignore it.

Sensitivezombie ,

A Wells Fargo spokesperson told Bloomberg that the company "holds employees to the highest standards and does not tolerate unethical behavior."

Says an unethical piece of shit corporation that secretly opened millions of unauthorized accounts of their customers to collect bogus fees, appease their shareholders and financial status.

Were the executives fired? No. Were they jailed for financial fraud? No.

https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/wells-fargo-agrees-pay-3-billion-resolve-criminal-and-civil-investigations-sales-practices

captain_oni ,

"Highest standards" my ass. My job provides service to Wells Fargo; their fraud claims department is full of the rudest, most condescending people I've had the displeasure to work with.

flop_leash_973 ,

But they did use their mouse for valid company business, so it is all OK.

Chakravanti ,

If they're yet another stereotypical thieving baron then doesn't that make it actually ethical to do fucking any kind of damage or do you gotta be heath ledger to actually be the good guy there?

UnderpantsWeevil ,
@UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world avatar

Says an unethical piece of shit corporation that secretly opened millions of unauthorized accounts of their customers to collect bogus fees, appease their shareholders and financial status.

It's unethical for the workers to pretend to open those accounts by using software to trick their administrators into looking busy.

r0ertel ,

I'm not disagreeing with you, but your last sentence isn't correct.

Last year, the former head of the bank’s retail operation was sentenced to three years of probation, while the bank’s former CEO was banned from the industry.

Cort ,

I think technically op may be correct, as being banned from an industry is different from the business firing them. And probation isn't jail time

Triasha ,

Sorry to come with "um, ackshuslly" but they didn't ask if they were convicted of a crime. The question was "were they jailed? And according to your post, they were not.

r0ertel ,

True. I was referring more to the first part about being fired. After rereading it, the two weren't "fired". Although 3 years of probation isn't nothing, it's a far cry from what many feel should have been done. The CEO was banned from the industry, which is something.

I'd really be curious to know if the punishment of the CEO & "head of retail operations" provided relief to the people affected by their crime AND was substantial enough to change their behavior.I feel that those items are what the sentencing should be about.

billwashere ,

My ex-MIL worked for Wells Fargo and opened an account for me to help meet her quota. Then I started getting overdraft fees because there was no money in the account to pay the monthly fees for the account I didn’t want or use. I had her close it. So yeah the whole company was kinda duplicitous.

interdimensionalmeme ,

Only reason they got got is the company used windows recall to spy on them

fuzzzerd ,

It's ok to think recall is invasive and bad for privacy, but it isn't even released yet. If you're gonna hate something and drag it through the mud, do it for real and valid reasons.

ArmokGoB ,

When I worked there, they wouldn't assign me tasks and then blamed me when nothing got done.

Live_your_lives ,

The way you phrased this could go either way: were you never taking on more work, no matter how obviously it needed to get done, just because you weren't explicitly told to do that job? Because that would be a fair criticism in my estimation.

TubularTittyFrog ,

the reality is that incompetent managers love to blame their employees for not doing shit they never told them to do.

CileTheSane ,
@CileTheSane@lemmy.ca avatar

Once had a manager repeatedly tell me I needed to "manage my time better" when I told them I didn't have enough time in the day to get all my tasks done. So I logged my time one day (9-11 worked on task A, 11-1230 worked on task B, etc.) and went to my manager to show them. "This is how long I am spending on each task, can you tell me which ones I am spending too long on and how I can be more efficient?" Manager told me to give them the log and they'll get back to me.

They never did get back to me, but they did end up reassigning my duties to other people who were also not given enough time to complete them.

go_go_gadget ,

If you want me to make executive decisions then pay me like an executive.

UnderpantsWeevil ,
@UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world avatar

executive decisions

3 Wood or 9 Iron?

CileTheSane ,
@CileTheSane@lemmy.ca avatar

I'll trade you a coal and 2 brick.

DragonTypeWyvern ,

I wish executives were that cool.

ipkpjersi ,

I'm not sure how fair it is. How would you know what work there is if there aren't any tickets being assigned for example?

Live_your_lives ,

I guess it depends on the employer. I don't do office work myself, but according to what I've heard from my wife about her jobs in banking adjacent fields, she has a few different queues of things to do that everyone takes from.

UnderpantsWeevil ,
@UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world avatar

were you never taking on more work, no matter how obviously it needed to get done

Bad management creates excess redundant and disorganized labor for the base worker.

If your boss is shitting this stuff out uncontrollably, perhaps that's their problem more than yours.

Either way, sacking all those people won't get the work done any faster.

Blackmist ,

Did you try just staring at the screen and jiggling the mouse? This appears to be their only way of measuring productivity.

blarth ,

Ya really gotta click occasionally and maybe type a few things.

masquenox ,

Getting blamed for their incompetence was the task.

Tja ,

Please

intensely_human ,

Same actually

werefreeatlast ,

Chat-gpt can you please follow my mouse around and then just keep doing that movement for a while until I move the mouse myself? Put my video from yesterday's windows 11 recall at this time on so that any admin logging in right now can think that I'm actually working.

As a reminder, at work, an admin can login to your PC and watch a stupid mouse jiggler do its jiggling to catch you. Be smarter, work harder!

RaoulDook ,

All you really need is a better mouse mover. Cradle for the mouse with a wheel under it with a pattern designed to make the mouse move around randomly.

explodicle ,

Hardware solution is the way. Then they need much bigger software to detect it.

RaoulDook ,

Yep hardware that's not connected to your work device at all

werefreeatlast ,

But literally the admin can remote to your screen and watch the pointer jiggle if you're using a jiggler lol.

RaoulDook ,

I never mentioned a jiggler. I was talking about better devices that move the device at random. They can move the mouse all over the screen, but an observer might be able to see that it was not normal activity if they watched it for long.

Fjern ,
@Fjern@lemmy.world avatar

Oh lord.
Glad i don't live in a country where that kind of intrusion and surveillance is legal.

werefreeatlast ,

I think it hasn't been tried in court enough. Like it's illegal to watch you poop by installing a camera in the restroom and making sure you are actually pooping and not just sitting and pretending to poop.

But would the court find it illegal to have the laptop camera be used to secretly look at you say every 3 minutes to make sure you're focused on work and not slacking off?

ChaoticEntropy ,
@ChaoticEntropy@feddit.uk avatar

"More than a dozen employees" for Wells Fargo is basically no one.

Simulation6 ,

Gee, I would think a company like Wells Fargo would want to promote these innovators to management positions.

sunbeam60 ,

Monitoring employees in this way is just the shittiest shit of all the shit. Surely they can assess output in a different way?

Wiz ,

Right. Do they have a manager assigning them work? And then after a couple of weeks of mouse-juggling, no assignments done.

It sounds like poor management, too, aside from the mouse-jiggling.

cestvrai ,

Management is probably also mouse jiggling…

it_depends_man ,

Ah yes. Work that tracks you, not by your output, but by whether your mouse jiggles a statistically correct amount. Nice.

chiliedogg ,

The jigglers keep you online status from changing to "away."

Some jobs require you to be at your desk, and using mouse jigglers to fake being at work is the kind of thing that keeps more companies from allowing WFH.

IamtheMorgz ,

If the job requires you to be at your desk then presumably that means you have work to complete. Judge people for what they get done, not how often they mindlessly move a mouse and this wouldn't be a problem!

chiliedogg ,

Some jobs necessarily include idle time when you're waiting for work to come through even if there's nothing to do in that specific moment. The flip side of that is that the employer is able to require that the worker be available instantly. If they're leaving their work area because they're bored then they're not "at work."

My Dad was a career firefighter, and he spent most of his time sitting in the station watching TV, cooking meals, or sleeping. He was paid for every minute of that time because at the drop of a hat he could be called to a wreck, fire, or medical emergency.

The reason he had to be paid is federal law requiring that all workers who are "engaged to wait" are on the clock. If someone is installing mouse-jiggler software so they can leave their workstation and do whatever they want, they're no longer being engaged to wait.

Fedizen ,

Is that really true though? If I crank my volume for notifications and then read a book while waiting for my next call how is that less engaged than like reading an ebook on the same computer?

chiliedogg ,

Frankly - it's a lot harder to quantify. "Time at desk" is easy to track. Response times to tickets are much more variable and difficult to measure.

CileTheSane ,
@CileTheSane@lemmy.ca avatar

My Dad was a career firefighter, and he spent most of his time sitting in the station watching TV, cooking meals, or sleeping. He was paid for every minute of that time because at the drop of a hat he could be called to a wreck, fire, or medical emergency.

So if I'm WFH and need to be available I can be watching TV or cooking a meal as long as I'm available at the drop of a hat if something comes in. This can be more usefully measured by how quickly I respond or my work output rather than how much my mouse moves.

it_depends_man ,

Sure. Yes. I'm aware.

The point is, if an employee isn't productive, the company should notice, because they should be running some kind of oversight over the work either being done or not being done.

If the work is being done, even if the employee isn't always 100% focused, the company shouldn't care.

If the work is not being done, the company should care, regardless of how active the mouse moves.

using mouse jigglers to fake being at work is the kind of thing that keeps more companies from allowing WFH.

No, companies don't allow WFH because they don't trust employees or can't verify, employees doing their work from home. Most of the time, because the company people don't understand that work and couldn't judge if it's being done correctly without adults in the room.

tldr: people should be hired and fired based on their performance. Crazy talk, I know.

go_go_gadget ,

It's crazy how quickly people Boomers, managers, executives and capitalists flip flop between "Salary is performance based you don't have set hours" to "You didn't work every hour from 9-5". This hypocritical nonsense only drives more people to take on anti-work perspectives.

Perturabo ,

Even if you are at your desk and say waiting for a ticket to come in or a call, you'll be set to away so it doesn't make sense to moitor by that.

Worked in IT 9 years and never come across a company that monitors this.

Dicska ,

70 year old management member who came up with the idea of using this metric in the first place:

  • "The system shows you haven't touched your mouse for half an hour."

  • "Yes, I worked out a solution on paper, like back in the old days."

[confused noises]

  • All
  • Subscribed
  • Moderated
  • Favorites
  • •
  • technology@lemmy.world
  • random
  • incremental_games
  • meta
  • All magazines
    •